I was very proud and grateful to be the first African-American woman in the position. I thought it said a lot about our country that we had back-to-back African-American Secretaries of State, Colin Powell and then me. I also thought it said a lot about President Bush that he didn't see limits on the highest ranking diplomat in terms of color. It's a hard job, but really the best one in government.

We've got to get back to a sense of an American identity, and that identity is not nationality or religion or ethnicity. It is a particular idea, and that idea is that you should live in liberty and you should be able to pursue happiness.

Great leaders never accept the world as it was and always work for the world as it should be

There clearly are contacts between al Qaeda and Iraq that can be documented; there clearly is testimony that some of the contacts have been important contacts and that there's a relationship here

We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud.

Multiethnic character of America is very attractive to people. They also see a place where you get ahead, not because of where you came from, but because of where you want to go.

When I said I had always hoped to marry in my race, I really do mean that. That doesn't mean I absolutely wouldn't marry outside of it, but there's a culture and traditions to maintain, and I have great pride in them, and I always thought it would be wonderful to share that with somebody of my race.